Dracula Year Zero – assuming it keeps that full name, after several reports have it now simply titled after the main character – serves as a new origin story for the fang club favourite, with Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless’ script following young prince Vlad, who must fight to protect his wife and child from a bloodthirsty sultan.

Yet in the process of defending them, he ends up becoming the first vampire. Which, we would imagine, will make family dinners even more awkward than usual.

This one has been in development for years, and was for a while a passion project of Alex Proyas. Now, though, Gary Shore is the man with the megaphone, having scored plenty of attention with his short The Cup Of Tears (check it out right here) and landed the Dracula gig last year.

Universal has quietly put the thing into pre-production, hoping that it’ll finally start shooting later this year. Evans, as mentioned above, will go bumper-to-bumper with Vin Diesel and the gang in the sixth Fast film, which screeches in on May 17. He’ll also be seen as Bard the Bowman in The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug, due December 13.